Date windows on wristwatches can be a touchy subject. Many feel they are downright ugly and destroy the look of a good watch, while others swear by them as the most useful and affordable complication. Whatever camp you may be in, the date function can be the cause of considerable grief, particularly the rapid-set mechanism.
Sometimes perpetual calendars are too complicated but a simple calendar just doesn’t cut it anymore because nearly half the months have less than 31 days, making it five adjustments a year too many for some. But don’t fret, there is a middle ground between the most basic calendar watches and complex perpetual calendars: the annual calendar automatically adjusts for each month with 30 or 31 days, meaning just one adjustment per year for the owner in February. Here’s a brief history of the complication.
“Good morning, sir. Welcome to Rolex! And it goes downhill from there.
Joshua Munchow explains why people are drawn to brightly colored watches. His personal opinion is that everyone should have at least one bright, colorful watch in their collection and he makes the case for why the excitement around the Tiffany Blue Nautilus is perfectly rational – because colorful watches are awesome!
Out of all the “traditional” styles of hairsprings, the helical hairspring is Joshua Munchow’s favorite because it adds three-dimensionality to the watch. These oscillators are so rarely seen that if you are only aware of five watches with helical hairsprings you already know a significant portion of the modern watches using them. Here are Joshua’s favorite five.
A few brands and watches stand high above the rest. They are known to almost everyone and have become icons. Watches of this stature are not cheap, however, there are alternatives out there that are as compelling in their own right for a fraction of the price.
The (or at least one) definition of Faith is a strongly held conviction or belief that is not based on proof. Faith in a conviction is a powerful force that can bond many people together for good or for evil. Ian Skellern debunks a few falsehoods, including Rolex deliberately limiting supply.
Rolex is one of the largest, most prominent brands in the world. Unlike many other brands of this size, Rolex is a private company and so it is somewhat opaque when it comes to hard facts about what goes on behind closed doors. But some numbers can be found online, and are used to determine roughly how many watches Rolex makes a year and how much revenue is made per model.
Ian Skellern’s suggestion for an International Chronometry Competition is a group of well-heeled collectors – brands/independents are also welcome to participate, but I suspect they will wait to see how it goes – set off from, say, Geneva, but could be New York, Dubai, or Singapore, wearing one or two watches, on a two-week world tour. Here he explains how it might work.
Mechanical watches have become about so much more than precision. They are status symbols, works of art and passion, a testimony of human ingenuity, and much more. Precision, as long as it reaches a certain standard, plays second fiddle. Martin Green thinks that brands should devote more emphasis to precision and he has an idea to encourage that.